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3 May 2022
If you haven’t heard about pickleball, it’s time to learn. Pickleball, a sport invented in the US in Bainbridge Island, WA, is rapidly becoming more and more popular in the US, and for a good reason: it’s fun! To put it simply, pickleball is a cross between tennis and ping-pong. It’s basically if you were to scale up a ping-pong table and run around on the table as you bounce a ball back and forth with big ping-pong paddles.
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In Arizona, in particular, it’s also quickly becoming very popular. This is probably because the weather in Arizona is perfect weather for outdoor pickleball about 8 out of the 12 months of the year. It’s also no secret that retirees enjoy living part-time in Arizona to enjoy the warm weather while escaping the heat by relocating back up north (also known as snowbirds). And because pickleball is a highly accessible sport, it has been naturally appealing to older folks who love to stay active.
But while retirees seem to be the demographic that is putting pickleball on the map, it is starting to dawn on people of all ages that pickleball is a blast. Especially here in Arizona. According to Google, Arizona ranks as the 3rd most popular state for interest in pickleball. Not only that but Gilbert and Scottsdale rank in the top 15 cities with the most significant number of pickleball courses per 20,00 residents in the US in 2020. And that number is growing. The largest indoor pickleball facility in the U.S. will open in Chandler sometime in 2022, and ‘The Topgolf of pickleball’ is coming to metro Phoenix in 2023.
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Pickleball, like tennis, can have some obscure rules that can cause you to scratch your head at the logic; does that add to the fun? Who knows, but it sure makes you feel like you’re part of an exclusive club.
We love to explain the game in total but to give it the explanation it deserves, check out this fully comprehensive guide to playing pickleball: the official USA Pickleball rule guide.
As for my own experience, pickleball is best played when you have at least one experienced player to help you with the tricky rules of the game. Rules like how to call the score, when you can and can’t step in “the kitchen,” and when you must allow the ball to bounce on your side of the court, to name a few rules of the game that can get in your head. Once you get the hang of it, it can soon become a favorite sport!
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Author’s note: this topic was thanks to a reader’s article suggestion. Thank you, reader! If you have a topic you’d like us to explore, feel free to fill out the article suggestion box to the bottom right!
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